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Thursday, Jul 24, 2025
7 PM (100 mins)
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BAMPFA
The Phenix City Story
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Introduction and Post-Screening Discussion
Eddie Muller is founder and president of the Film Noir Foundation, director of the Noir City film festival, and a novelist.
John McIntire, Richard Kiley, Kathryn Grant, Edward Andrews,
Phenix City, Alabama (a.k.a. “Sin City, U.S.A.”), became nationally notorious in 1954, when the good-ol’-boy gangsters who ran the town’s vice rackets conspired to murder Albert Patterson, a local lawyer who’d just been elected Alabama’s attorney general. Filmed on location while the murder trial was still in progress, Phil Karlson’s raw report opens with newsreel footage of journalist Clete Roberts interviewing townspeople involved in the events. The drama that follows, cowritten by Daniel Mainwaring (Invasion of the Body Snatchers), mixes actors with real-life residents and facts with invented incidents in a shockingly detailed depiction of depravity and corruption.
FILM DETAILS
Screenwriter
- Daniel Mainwaring
- Crane Wilbur
Cinematographer
- Harry Neumann
Print Info
- B&W
- 35mm
- 100 mins
Source
- Park Circus
Event Accessibility
If you have any questions about accessibility or need accommodations to attend this event, please contact us at bampfa@berkeley.edu or (510) 642-1412 (Wed–Sun, 11 AM–7 PM) as soon as you can. Advance notice helps us fulfill your request.
Learn more about accessibility services at BAMPFA.